Feel free to laugh

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Mass air flow sensor

Something on Soho le chien has pushed my loony button.Go there first, I stoled the meme from there.That's odd, the spellchecker didn't say anything about "stoled"

Pre-historically, tribes fought with each other. After thousands of years of scientific, political, artistic and religious "revolutions" we entered the Atomic era where tribes fight with each other.Viewing the whole thing from the rim of my Guinness, it seems to me that "revolutions" are but hemorrhoids on the artery of history. Painful, itchy, unsavory but otherwise meaningless."Genius" is the same sort of thing. Everyone has his own genius. The great "geniuses" of history are a product of advertising hype as much as anything.most "Great discoveries" are the result of thousands of person-hours of mundane work claimed by one egomaniac who happened to show up to work on time for once.Check it out. Read up on the "discovery" of the helical structure of DNA was discovered. A few more people than Watson and Crick were involved. Who's covering up what here?"The Calculus" has several genius discoverers but Old Applebonker Newton gets the credit.Einstein? All he did was find a slightly different way to calculate the orbits of stars and planets. The much more important work on the genetic code was done by who? Didn't think you knew.It's all show biz. Discovery is just another step in the process.Remember those prehistoric tribes who fought with each other?Where do you think Rock-n-Roll comes from?In spite of all the musical history hemorrhoids.Huh?Not to mention Stravinsky, Jazz, and Beethoven's 7th symphony.So I won't mention that. Anyway I got the Volvo's Mass Air Sensor on order and as soon as the parts house calls back I'll go get it. Of course they can't call as long as I am on line.I have more whacko opinions, but.......?But my horoscope told me to keep a lid on it today.Wait, what did it actually say .....I'll be right backO.K. here it isPisces; This is an excellent time to kiss and make up to repair the smallest misunderstanding.Dear Miss Understanding, A kiss wont be necessary but we could talk about it. E-mail me.Wonder what hers says?

Sunday, October 28, 2007

'Round 'round, git around, she git around

Alright, it was my first Iphigenia in Taurus. The music seemed pedestrian (which turned out to be an omen of future events) The libretto seemed lame, the bulk of story happens offstage and elsewhere. All we get to see is Iffy waiting to kill her brother then trying to kill her brother then not killing her brother. The thing doesn't work unless we know the whole bloody story of the Anaisiwhooses family.It's more of an episode than a complete work.(Tune in next week when Iff and Oreo have it out big time on "Laugh in with the Gods")The story doesn't actually show up much on stage.Not having a college education, I am not familiar with that particular saga.I assume that it is a lot like the soap opera "Dallas" which I never watched. My point is a single work of art should be complete in itself. The four episodes of "The Ring" are. I had this problem with Morning becomes Electra, which starts out with the murder of the only (seemingly) rational member of the gang.The set was gorgeous. Like an old Rembrandt or some other famous oil painting.Anyway, getting out of the one episode and back into the myth as a whole, that girl sure got around for some one who started all the trouble by getting herself killed.I can understand the fascination that this story had for P.D.Q.But what do I know?Only he who is running nose.Audience response was enthusiastic. They are probably all "persons of an higher education persuasion" So, on our way out, while I was planning all the clever things I would say to you here, the Volvo ceased functioning properly ("crapped out on us" is the technical term) so we had to wait at the local 7-11 for a tow truck and I missed a significant proportion of SNL.I'm pretty sure that it's the hot wire mixture control huachamacallit It broke at about 150,000 mi so I can't complain.That's not true, is it? I make a habit of complaining. It's an Art and a sport.I notice on other blog sites that the subject of the vitality of "Classical Music" is still being bruited about. I'm not sure what, if anything, that's all about.Terms need to be defined.Terms like "Classical""Death of""Audience for""Record sales""Record sales""Record""Popular""Money""Pneumoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconosis'Wait I do know what that one means, even though I can't spell it(spellcheck has "no suggestions")There seems to be some rumbling about a woman's place in the music biz.I always think of Nannerl's choice.Hmmm...should I go on the road like my silly brother borrowing money and hoping the next show will be a hit and then die young (freeze to death in a garret is the technical term)?Or should I marry the count and live in the warmth and comfort that wealth and social position can provide and live long enough to reap the rewards of the little snot's fame?

I suppose I could reach for my Gutman or my Hildesheimer either one of which is a mere arms length away and look up who or what she did marry, but, you know why bother?

I think it's a post called "attitude" in which I outline the definitive and comprehensive history of music.

While talking to a telephonic fund raiser for the Seattle Opera, Meredith, in order to demonstrate who made the money in this menage a deux, mentioned that I wrote "serious music"

Friday, October 26, 2007

Grrr!

O.J.; Prosecution took a dive because they feared that conviction would cause rioting. That's what thats all about.

J. Bell's busking experiment was a definition of elitist arrogance. He is a musician who makes a living at it, for Christ sake! People who have to work to pay the mortgage on homes that cost less than one quarter of that fiddle of his are supposed to stop and genuflect because he's co-opting the spot of some poor musician who could have used the 35 bucks?

Gimme a break, musical elitists.

Contrast and compare; Hitler's genocidal invasion of Poland and Joshua's genocidal invasion of Canaan.The most significant thing about "The Holocaust" was that it was (and still is) "Business as usual" Why should anyone care more about that than about Wounded knee, Viet Nam, The Brits in India, or the Lakota on one of their raids into the southern tribes.

Every time a major orchestra has an opening for a musician, about 200 applicants show up. This means that there are 200 orchestras out there that will never be heard.

Damn, I seem to be running out of steam already.Just a sec, I'll go back to Soho and recharge.

I liked Blair Tindall's book. Most probably for the "sour grapes" flavor that goes directly to the soul of this site.

I don't want to hear any complaints that I'm not being funny today even though the site is advertised as a humourous one.

Thousands of bloodthirsty years so that we can play Beethoven's 9th symphony over and over and over.That's one of Gods lesser jokes.

Oh yeah Beethoven liked to shove the "nobility" aside because he believed in "equality". Believing in equality made him better than they were. He could believe in equality because he was "The Greatest Composer".

I guess that qualifies as a rant. Let's hear what the Judges have to say.

Sunday, October 21, 2007

Last night

Laura De Luca played Mozart's clarinet concerto with her usual aplomb.Wonderful piece of musicMuch better than my clarinet concerto

Tchaikovsky's forth symphony filled the hall (IKEA PAC attached to Renton high school, a small place but with decent acoustics,would be better with a full house, so go there, support 'em)It was announced that this symphony's "program" was his relationship with a lunatic who became his wife and the subsequent disaster. I didn't hear it that way at all. It has never occurred to me any time I've heard it that it had any "program" at all.The only program I've ever heard is Beethoven's trip to the countryside.Berlioz's insistence about his drug taking artist in Symphonie Fantastique doesn't seem to relate to the music atall atall.The only picture or story I perceive from the Tchaikovsky is the usual profoundly moody Russian "Vodka and Frostbite" atmosphere. Even the light bits remind me of crackling ice (I spent a couple winters in or near Fairbanks). The fuller chords bring back the memory of air as a solid object and temperature as a sure sign that God has better things to do than to keep one from becoming an icicle But, I am a genius, not an expert. So there.

Anyway, I'm inspired today and I am going to go to my other computer (Named "Piano", isn't that cute), the one with Sibelius and the lovely GPO (which I refer to at times as "My Orgasmatron" (from "Sleeper" by Woody Allen)and COMPOSE.

I am very pleased to hear from Alex Shapiro and will try to post more pictures of our local scenic beauty.Any contact with real musicians always makes me feel more like one (a real musician) than I probably deserve.

Saturday, October 20, 2007

Rainier Symphony

Tonight we got to hear the Rainier Symphony.Sister and Brother in law are going with us.I put a new link on the site, "pageflakes" it's sort of an index of classical music blog sites.Norman Lebrecht is in trouble for something he wrote about some record company.I can sympathize. At least he knows what the complaint is.The only interaction I've ever had with that industry is the time in '65 when I picked the pebbles out of the tread of a Columbia exec's Pegaso. Mr Lebrecht is accused of failure to check facts. Whooof! meat and potatoes to this site, eh?The spine of this literary obscenity, this blot on the electronic etherworld, is my ignorance and incompetence.

Go with your strengths.

I've been reading about emotional reactions to music on other sites.My wife has emotional reactions to music. I don't exactly understand that sort of thing, especially in public.

Sometimes Beethoven raises a giggle.

My main emotional reaction to even being in public is paranoia.Which, as far as I'm concerned is rational fear considering the treatment I got for having the temerity to actually like one of SSO's employees.I like all of them, actually.Even the one I saw at Caffe Ladro last Wed.The bear, not the singer.

Anyway, I suppose it's my job to consider all other composers "competition" and all other music "inferior" to the stuff I will eventually write as soon as I get the hang of it.I go to concerts to study music, sort of like that little German spy on "Laugh-in" hiding with his spyglasses behind the foliage."Weeyry eenterestink, but a plagal cadence in the mediant? Pfui!"Not that I actually know what those musical terms actually mean."Just making it up as I goes along". (from Finnegans Wake by James Joyce)Wonderful article in New Yorker about bloggers esp our beloved "Think Denk" Jeremy has it linked, if you don't get the magazine itself.Ho humm....... what else?

The enthusiasm on those other sites has me quite exhausted. I'd better go now and rest up for tonight's concert.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Wednesday adventures

Amazing story but true. Only the names have been changed (and a hefty proportion of the facts)While I was having my coffee and cookie at my usual coffeehouse, I heard, wafting through the air, the most beautiful soprano voice singing the "Queen of the night" aria from Mozart's "Magic Flute"What an incredible voice, hitting the high notes with amazing ease, making it seem as if it could go on climbing forever (or maybe just another 3rd) The tone, which, in many voices begins to get shrill and screechy at these altitudes, was as full bodied and as soul shaking as Leontyne Price's and as beautifully nuanced as Joan Sutherland's with light background of hops and a hint of wheat grass.I looked around for the source of the supernal sound, thinking that someone had not plugged in their headphones but it turned out to be a live performance by a local celebrity whose name you would recognize instantly if I were not morally obligated not to reveal due to the artist's desire to forgo what would undoubtedly be the greatest singing career ever known to man or beast.

(The artist) wishes to remain anonymous so as to continue (the artist's) charitable works without hindrance.

Besides (the artist) doesn't need the money.

Or the fame.

Oh yeah, I was also growled at by one of the bear clan who happened by... Tres risement.

Unfortunately, later that same day, I found that my class had been canceled due to an indisposition of a viral persuasion. Just when I need it most in order to get the violin duet score straightened out.I am still just an amateur and a student and I really don't know beans about scoring for violins.

Unable to upload image

All right, no picture today but, here's the "poem". It's about the timelessness of the cabin "Christie". Named for that mountain across the lake. The resort is named "Lochaerie". I don't know who the mountain was named for. The cabin was built in 1932. It sits on a hunk of...Oh, lets call it granite, that is named for some reason "Onion rock". Still funky after all these years. The floor is uneven and the whole thing wobbles when you shut the refrigerator door.

Time is too busyTime does not standMountains to rain onAnd grind into sand

Time is importantTime's on the runPlanets to form And fling to the sun

But Christie protects us Keeps Time at bay Safe in her refuge As long as we stay

Hours, Days, YearsWords heard in a dreamChristie is graceful Safe and serene

One minute is always Whenever we stay Thanks to our Christie Time stays away

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Today

Today, I work on violin score. Today, I load vacation pictures to computer. Today, I clean the kitchen.Today, I perhaps, eat popcorn.Tomorrow, I might post a site-specific poem along with picture of the site in question.The site being "Christie" the cabin perched on Onion rock.But, Today, Today, ah, yes, Today

Monday, October 15, 2007

More than one, less than three

Well, I shoulda turned off the comment moderator but I dint and it's too late. Anyway I'm back and wondering which cuck cuck won the award. So even after all this time, it is still now. As per usual.It rained at Lake Quinault. We got wet on short hikes.I had a conversation with a Sea-serpent, Lake serpent, actually.I recorded it."Me OgopogoMe from Lake WashingtonMe not like it thereToo much noise, airplanes, boats, make nervousPeople not taste goodTaste like big makMake butt look bigMe leaveSwim through locksSwim in Puget sound, salt water, yuckMe swim 'round Olympic peninsulaHey, Makah!, me not whaleLong swim down coastWrong river firstFinally find QuinaultAhhhh!Peaceful, quiet, Me like it here People who write haiku taste betterLess cholesterolGet in shapeAdd centuries to life"

I'm an iambic pentameter man myself, love McDonald's food

Just before we left, I saw Total Recall on the telly.A friend asked which P.K.Dick that was based on. I don't know, but I'm now thinking that I shoulda tole her to ask the question on this site. Butch prolly nose.But I feel silly trying to ask people to visit here. So. I. Did. n't.Maybe I will e-mail her. She's a prettygood poet her own self. If anyone has a right to know which of PKD's poetry the governor of Calif was declaiming, it's Judith.

I sent score for the violin thing (it's called "Far.Cry.Blue.")to the violinist.I haven't heard back yet. He's probably consulting with a lawyer or called the cops on me or something. I await, as always for the crash of the boot on the door in the wee hours of the morning and the subsequent rattling staccato of machine gun fire.I know they're coming to get me for something, whether it's talking to white girls or writing socially inappropriate music. I feel the cold wind.

Anyway, Vito seems happy. Well, not happy exactly, but at least not as menacingly angry as he was last time we talked. Well WE didn't talk. He did all the talking. I found it hard to respond appropriately through the duck tape.Butt, that's behind me.

My favorite Religion site has invited all comers to become facebook friends.This is the organization that led my sweetheart Meighan out in to the desert for a long march into a promised land and I hope she finds it.So I'm tempted.Friends are a good thing.

Sunday, October 07, 2007

Vacation

'Bye kids. We're leaving for the coast.Now, I want you kids to play nice.Whatever you do, don't break into the cooler where the kegs are stored.Use the keys I left by the kitchen door.If you must have a party, try to keep it down, (to a dull roar, heh heh)No more than three hundred of your most intimate friends.By the way the envelope for the Sheriff is in the safe with the money for Vito, The Sheriff will be by Tuesday. Vito's money is in the yellow box on the right. Whatever else, don't mess with Vito's money.Whatever else, don't mess with Vito's money.I know I said that twice, but it is an important point.Makes a big difference as to whether we come back or not.Vito himself won't show up, but somebody will come 2:00 AM Friday. The password is "Angelo sends his regards"Whatever else, don't mess with Vito's money.

If we're not back by the 15th, well...let's not worry about that, 'K?If Vito doesn't get his money, Yo no habla englese, if you know what I mean.I will be practicing my foreign language skills for a while, a long while.

If you leave the house, don't forget to set security.Let the dogs run regularly.Don't forget to feed them, or they will take matters into their own paws and you can think of yourself as pitbull chow. Just kidding.Although both Adolf and Sid seem to have gotten the knack of unlatching the cougar cage, so watch out for that.

I'm taking the kite I got for Christmas, let's hope the weather pans out this time.

Anyway have fun while we're gone, and don't forget the SheriffAnd don't mess with Vito's money.

Friday, October 05, 2007

New link

I just don't have the psychological strength these days to clown around making a fool of my self in public in accordance with the ground rules of this site, but I do feel guilty for not blogging for a couple of days, so this sentence is an apology, I guess.Pathetic. New link, Classical Seattle. For those of you who want to take this stuff seriously.I've got my violinists, sent the scores off today.Still many a slip between score and performance.Anxiety is my favorite weakness."It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide."I read that in a mad magazine back in the '50s. Only recently found the word "rozzer"in a British mystery story, it means "Copper" or the like.Great, only three or four words to go.Ho hum....(see "deliberately boring")A week at the coast looming.After RUBY'S 3rd birthday party and a concert by Symphonia Northwest this weekend, we are off.Damn, I'm going to miss Keith Eisenbrey's recital. It will be at University Temple United Methodist Church1415 N.E. 43rd St. in Seattle at 2:00 PM on Saturday, October 13You go, tell me about it.

Monday, October 01, 2007

Philosophy and other idle chatter.

Pop on over to "Dial M for Musicology" and check out the little Alan Watts cartoons.There is a link there to more of 'em.Then read Michael Shermer's article in the Oct issue of Scientific American. His column is titled "Sceptic". It's on page 44.Then go to Soho the dog and read "Quote of the day" and the ensuing comments.Then write a 1500 word essay as to "What it's all about" and have it on my desk by next Thursday.This will count for half your grade for the semester.Friday's show presented by non-sequiter in the Chapel at Good Shepard was outstanding. It was all about Latin American music. That is Modern music by Latin American composers. Not the stereotyped salsas, tangos, mambos, sambas, meringues or trumpets flashing in the sun. Nowhere in the whole evening did any one bay "Babaloo (cy)" I would be more informative here, but I've lost the program. I do remember that one of the composers presenting was from Mexico and the other was Cuban from Vancouver. The usual combination of acoustics and my hearing kept me from hearing much of what they said but, being that they are the "competition", I was just indulging myself in my usual petty infantile jealousy anyway.The music was terrific.I did manage to meet and greet several people, comrades in the Seattle music scene. Got a lead on violinists.The rest of the weekend was domestic. With some kind of feeble viral invasion that caused sleepiness and a bloody nose.Next week we will bundle the family into the old jalopy and head out to the coast for a deserved rest (Meredith deserves it anyway, all I do anymore is take it easy.We will spend the majority of the week in a funky cabin on the north shore of Lake Quinault then the next weekend at the Sou'wester in Seaview where we will be dining as often as possible at The Depot where the food is magnificent.Reading books, eating cookies and sleeping.

Remember, today is the day that balances precariously between the first and the last of your life. According to the Einstein's concept of "relativity", you are perfectly free to consider yourself the center of the universe, believe the world is flat or that the earth is fixed and the Sun revolves around it.

It's obvious about the Sun's path. I mean, just look at it.The flat earth thing doesn't speak to me. I look out the window and I see tiger mountain. I see Mount baker. I see Mount Rainier. I see no flat. So maybe Einstein was wrong.As to the center of the whatchacallit, You are the center of my whachacallit.